The Real Housewives of New Jersey
“If This RV is a Rockin'”
August 12, 2012
FIRST OF ALL: I understand that we are on a vacanza, or whatever, but I am having serious Mortadella withdrawl, yous guys. LESS MEN BUYING CHICKEN STOCK, MORE MORTADELLA.
SECOND OF ALL: I am catching up, bambini. I am almost there. I KNOW, I KNOW. The Phone Call. We will get to it this week, prometto.
Alright, so. As Albie plaintively sings to the melody of The Hit Single “On Display,” that they are still “camping in the tent, in the tent, in the tent. Next to the RVs that [they] rent, that [they] rent, that [they] rent.” Albert chops a small piece of wood with an axe. For some reason.
And Vito … Oh, Vito. Vito! Paisan! Here I thought yous was a nice boy who brought the sausage and the mozzarell, so why are you pulling down your pants and showing Folletto the darkest part of your soul? Why? What are you doing? Is it because Whatshername is about to be a part of our lives and you’re feeling insecure? Pull up your pants, Vito, and let us never speak of this again.
The goombahs, they drink a lot of wine and decide that now is the time to go surfing. For the first time ever. Because what could possibly go wrong with that plan? Everyone but Caroline, Lauren and Jacqueline squeeze themselves into wetsuits, flail around on giant skateboards (?) at the rental place, and then flop around in the surf for a while. Trying to surf, trying to surf, trying to surf, so much trying to surf, Teresa is competitive with Kathy, trying to surf. Eventually, Teresa leaps off her surfboard and because she, like everyone else, is drunk expects the water to be much deeper than it actually is, thereby landing on her foot, painfully. Folletto drags her into shore, thereby ending our surfing with guidos adventure.
In il Meatball/il Folletto’s gross RV of grossness, Meatball is teasing Folletto about the size of his … follettiny, and so Folletto just pulls down his underpants and shows it to Meatball and the cameras, of course he does. We’re lucky that this is the only time in this episode he’s pulled down his pants, honestly. Teresa, in the meantime, is half-drunk, half-crying about her swollen ankle, and icing it down with a roll of ground beef that Meatball occasionally takes from her to represent his follettiny. And between this and Vito and unSexy Grandpa and Sonja over on RHONY, I’m tired, yous guys. I’m just so very tired.
Melissa is even more drunk than Teresa, stumbling around in the back of the RV, drunk-girling about wanting another glass of wiiiiine and then rubbing Teresa’s thigh, which is how a befuddled Kathy discovers them. Kathy, realizing that Teresa’s ankle is pretty swollen, makes Teresa get up on it (?) and go sit outside with everyone (?) which is maybe not the best treatment, Kathy? And Laurita explains to the group that they are going to drive across the Golden Gate Bridge the next morning, which makes Meatball immediately become belligerent towards the Golden Gate Bridge: what’s so special about it?
The group decides to play Truth or Dare, which could be a dangerous proposition with these folks. Folletto is dared to go to a stranger’s RV in his underpants and ask for some fruit. Which, come on. How about asking Folletto to do something he wouldn’t otherwise do on any given Tuesday, for starters. And who knows what the other dares or truths were, because we instead cut to Lauren who brings the game to a screeching halt by asking Albie a Truth: is he’s worried about being separated from her and Christopher in the coming years. OH BROTHER. WAY TO KEEP THE PARTY GOING, LAUREN.
Also, also! You are all in your 20s! Of course you have to live apart, eventually, at some time, hopefully soon! It’s called Being Adults! DO IT. BE ADULTS.
Teresa begins crying about her ankle, and after Kathy urges Meatball to take care of her, and he pffts at this suggestion (of course), someone gets a first aid kit and wraps her ankle. Finally.
This does not stop Teresa, however, from trying to shove her swollen, wrapped ankle into a pair of zip-up, gold lame-splatter cowboy boots, the next morning, obviously. Obviously! What, do you expect her to not wear zip-up, gold lame-splattered cowboy boots with her short shorts just because of a possibly broken ankle? Come on. Quit being ridicolo.
The RVs head out for their next stop, Casini Ranch, which is over said Golden Gate Bridge (“It’s not gold! It’s red!” exclaim the idioti.), and through what appear to be hippie-infested woods. Topics of conversation in the various RVs include: Who has been making the sex on the trip; the fake buhbie competition between Melissa and Teresa; whether or not they will have cell phone service in the woods; all the scary hippies on the side of the road. (NOTE: They are not scary.)
Somewhere along the drive, Lindsey calls Albie, who takes the call on speaker phone, and she announces that she’s bringing her boxes to his apartment. And because Albie is a huge coward, Christopher is the one who explains to his parents that Lindsey is moving in with them. And that Lauren doesn’t know yet. And so Christopher tells Lauren over a walkie-talkie. And Lauren is not amused.
Upon arriving at Casini Ranch, the women, for laffs, send the men to the general store to pick up some food for dinner. The men return with chicken broth, some sort of spice rub, a mood ring for Teresa and a wiffle bat, because ha ha, men can’t shop. Somehow, from this sad collection of ingredients and sports equipment, they manage to scrape together a meal of ribs, several bowls of pasta, salads, and piles of bread and cheese and wine. It’s like the loaves and fishes, but with bouillon and fusilli.
At dinner, a of fight breaks out between Lauren and Christopher about I don’t even know what and Lauren snits and stomps back into the RV and I don’t care, I don’t care! I do not care.
The next day, the goombahs are loaded onto a bus and driven to a river where they are forced to canoe. Melissa, horrified at the specter of bugs (including some questionable species the guide refers to as “river ticks”), tadpoles and toads, is less than enthusiastic about the canoeing trip. Canoeing down the river, canoeing down the river, canoeing down the river. After a great deal of splashing and ramming into each other’s canoe shenanigans, Melissa and Folletto’s boat takes in too much water, and capsizes. Melissa screams and screams and thrashes as if she is being eaten alive by river ticks but the river is merely two feet deep which I know because Meatball is able to wade out and grab her, that’s how shallow it is. So shallow! Stop screaming, dummy!
After their canoeing adventure, Folletto and Meatball head into the bushes to pee together, as you do, and they make a casual sort of truce, sort of. Kinda.
That night at the campground, everyone agrees that things are going surprisingly well, which, of course means someone needs to try to ruin it. Teresa invites Jacqueline to help her with dessert/attack her for not being a good enough friend to Teresa through her attempts to be Teresa’s friend. Teresa is still hurt that Jacqueline tried to ask her about what was going on in her life! How could Jacqueline have done that? Jacqueline apologizes for making Teresa feel ambushed, and for being rather nasty towards Teresa at Melissa’s launch party, but she refuses to apologize for asking Teresa about her legal problems because that’s the sort of thing concerned friends who are concerned do. Jacqueline, reasonably, wants a friendship with Teresa that is based on honesty and not a magazine-spread fluff piece, but Teresa, she is only interested in Jacqueline being her friend if she accepts that the public image of Teresa that Teresa attempts to craft = The Real Teresa. (Does that make sense? I worry that doesn’t make sense.)
Jacqueline cries.
Teresa, attempting to make Jacqueline stop crying, apologizes for hurting Jacqueline, except that, as Teresa clearly explains, she never did hurt Jacqueline. And with that, Jac accepts Teresa’s not!apology, because she is a sucker, and they choose to be friends again. Whatever that means. (Nothing buono, I’m sure.)
The Real Housewives of New Jersey airs Sunday nights at 9 p.m. on Bravo.
This post originally appeared on the Hearst site Chron.com.